Before
the Court is Defendant State of Tennessee's motion to
dismiss (Doc. 17) and Plaintiff Curtis Long's motion to
dismiss Defendant's abstention argument as moot (Doc.
35). For the following reasons, Plaintiff's motion to
dismiss Defendant's abstention argument (Doc. 35) will be
DENIED, and Defendant's motion to
dismiss (Doc. 17) will be GRANTED.

I.
BACKGROUND

In
1984, Plaintiff pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated
sexual battery in Knox County, Tennessee, Criminal Court.
(Doc. 16, at 7.) The state court sentenced Plaintiff to ten
years imprisonment on each count to run concurrently.
(Id.) The state court also ordered that the sentence
run concurrently with three consecutive robbery sentences.
(Id.) By December 1993, Plaintiff had served the
entirety of his sentence for the aggravated sexual battery
charges, but remained incarcerated on the robbery sentences.
(Id.)

In
1994, Congress enacted the Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against
Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Program
Act, 42 U.S.C. § 14701, et seq., which required
states to enact their own systems of registering sex
offenders to maintain certain funding. (Id. at 8.)
Pursuant to this statute, Tennessee enacted the Sex Offender
Registry Act (the “SORA”) in 1994. (Id.)
Despite Plaintiff's aggravated sexual battery sentences
expiring in 1993, when no sex offender registry existed,
Defendant began enforcing the SORA against him in April 2016,
after his release from the robbery charges. (Id.)
Plaintiff alleges that, under the SORA, he is subjected to a
large number of cumbersome and complex registration,
disclosure, reporting, and fee requirements, as well as
restrictions on his travel, speech, and association. (See
generally Doc. 16.) According to Plaintiff, these
requirements and restrictions have had disastrous effects on
his familial relationships and career. (See generally
id.) Additionally, he alleges that, had he known of the
level of restriction he would endure, he would have not
pleaded guilty to the aggravated sexual battery charges in
1984. (Id. at 10, 74-75.)

On
March 17, 2017, Plaintiff filed “a State post
conviction and habeas corpus petition in the Criminal Court
for Knox County, Tennessee, challenging the application of
the [SORA] to him . . . ” (the “State Court
Action”). (Id. at 8.) Plaintiff filed the
instant action on March 28, 2017 (Doc. 1), “out of an
abundance of caution and to preserve any applicable statute
of limitations . . . ” (Doc. 16, at 8). Plaintiff
amended his complaint on August 15, 2017. (Doc. 16.)
Plaintiff challenges the constitutionality of the SORA, both
facially and as applied to him, and seeks declaratory and
injunctive relief prohibiting the enforcement of the Act
against him. (Id. at 77-87.)

Defendant
filed a motion to dismiss on September 15, 2017, arguing
that: 1) the Court should abstain from exercising
jurisdiction over the case under the principles of
Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (1971); and 2) in the
alternative, Plaintiff fails to state a claim upon which
relief may be granted. (Doc. 17.) On November 16, 2017,
Plaintiff reported that the Knox County Criminal Court
dismissed Plaintiff's state-law claims on procedural
grounds on October 31, 2017, but noted that “[he] may
appeal the dismissal . . . .” (Doc. 35.) On this basis,
Plaintiff moved the Court to dismiss Defendant's
abstention argument as moot. (Id.) Both motions are
now ripe for the Court's review.

II.
ABSTENTION

An
abstention under Younger v. Harris “does not
arise from lack of jurisdiction . . ., but from strong
policies counseling against the exercise of such jurisdiction
where particular kinds of state proceedings have already been
commenced.” Ohio Civil Rights Comm'n v. Dayton
Christian Schs., Inc., 477 U.S. 619, 626 (1986). Those
policies, which include comity and federalism, dictate that a
federal court must decline to interfere with pending state
proceedings involving important state interests, unless
extraordinary circumstances are present. Younger,
401 U.S. at 44-45. To abstain under Younger, three
requirements must be met: “1) there must be ongoing [or
pending] state judicial proceedings; 2) those proceedings
must implicate important state interests; and 3) there must
be an adequate opportunity in the state proceedings to raise
constitutional challenges.” Am. Family Prepaid
Legal Corp. v. Columbus Bar Ass'n, 498 F.3d 328, 332
(6th Cir. 2007) (quoting Squire v. Coughlan, 469
F.3d 551, 555 (6th Cir. 2006)). If these requirements are
met, a federal court should abstain absent extraordinary
circumstances, such as “bad faith, harassment, or
flagrant unconstitutionality.” Id. at 335
(quoting Squire, 469 F.3d at 557).

a.
Pending State Proceedings

Plaintiff
disputes the first prong, arguing that, because the Knox
County Criminal Court dismissed Plaintiff's claims in
October 2017, the State Court Action is no longer
“pending” for the purposes of
Younger.[1] (Doc. 35.) The Sixth Circuit Court of
Appeals, however, rejected the very same argument in
Federal Express Corp. v. Tennessee Public Service
Commission, 925 F.2d 962 (6th Cir. 1991), because the
pendency of a state proceeding for the purposes of
Younger is determined at the time the federal action
is filed.[2] In Federal Express, the plaintiff
filed a petition for review of a state agency's action
with the state appellate court and then filed a federal
complaint seeking declaratory and injunctive relief against
the state agency. Id. at 964. Before the federal
district court heard argument on the plaintiff's request
for a preliminary injunction, the plaintiff voluntarily
dismissed its petition for review of the agency action in the
state appellate court. Id. at 965. Despite the
plaintiff's dismissal of the state-court proceeding after
the federal complaint was filed, the district court dismissed
the federal action on the basis of Younger
abstention. Id. On appeal, the plaintiff argued that
the district court erred, because “[d]eference to a
state proceeding is not due” once that proceeding has
ended. Id. at 969. The Sixth Circuit disagreed and
affirmed the lower court's abstention. Id. at
969-70. The court noted that “the proper time of
reference for determining the applicability of
Younger abstention is the time that the federal
complaint is filed.” Id. at 969 (quoting
Zalman v. Armstrong, 802 F.2d 199, 204 (6th Cir.
1986)). Accordingly, because the plaintiff's petition for
review in the state appellate court was pending on the date
it filed the federal action, the first prong under
Younger was satisfied. Id.; see also
Loch v. Watkins, 337 F.3d 574, 578 (6th Cir. 2003)
(“[W]hen determining whether state court proceedings .
. . are pending, we look to see if the state court proceeding
was pending at the time the federal complaint was
filed.”); Carras v. Williams, 807 F.2d 1286,
1290 n.7 (6th Cir. 1986) (finding that a recent denial of a
petition for writ of certiorari by the Supreme Court
“ha[d] no effect on this portion of [the]
analysis” because “[a]t the time Carras filed his
federal suit, the state court action was still
ongoing”).

Here,
the State Court Action was indisputedly pending at the time
Plaintiff filed his federal complaint. Plaintiff alleges that
“[o]n March 17, 2017, [he] filed a State post
conviction and habeas corpus petition in the Criminal Court
for Knox County, Tennessee . . . .” (Doc. 16, at 8.)
Plaintiff filed the instant complaint on March 28, 2017 (Doc.
1), and Plaintiff acknowledges that the State Court Action
was not dismissed until October 31, 2017 (Doc. 35). The State
Court Action was pending for the purposes of
Younger.

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Moreover,
even if Plaintiff chose-or chooses-not to appeal the State
Court Action, [3]Younger abstention may still be
warranted pursuant to the Supreme Court&#39;s decision in
Huffman v. Pursue, Ltd., 420 U.S. 592 (1975). In
Huffman, county officials instituted a state
nuisance proceeding against an operator of a pornographic
theater. Id. at 595-98. The state trial court
determined that the operator was displaying obscene films in
violation of the state&#39;s nuisance law and rendered
judgment against the operator. Id. at 598. The
operator, in lieu of filing an appeal of the state
court&#39;s judgment, filed a federal action under 42 U.S.C.
&sect; 1983, alleging that the state nuisance law was
unconstitutional. Id. at 598. On appeal of the
district court&#39;s decision on the merits, the Supreme
Court held that the district court should have determined
whether to abstain under Younger. Id. at
612-13. The Court rejected the operator&#39;s argument that
Younger was not applicable because a state-court
proceeding was not &ldquo;pending&rdquo; when he filed the
federal action, noting that &ldquo;Younger and
subsequent cases . . . have used the term &lsquo;pending
proceeding&#39; to distinguish state proceedings which have
already been commenced from those which are merely incipient
or threatened.&rdquo; Id. at 607. Given the
principles announced in Younger and that &ldquo;it
is typically a judicial system&#39;s appellate courts which
are by their nature a litigant&#39;s most appropriate forum
for the resolution of constitutional contentions, &rdquo; the
Supreme Court held that, after a state-court proceeding has
been commenced, a federal plaintiff &ldquo;must exhaust his
state appellate remedies before seeking [federal] relief . .
., unless he can bring himself within one of the exceptions
specified in Younger.&rdquo; Id. at 608-09.
Moreover, the Court noted that it was irrelevant whether the
operator still had the option to appeal the state-court
judgment when the federal district court ...

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